Case Study About Wal*Mart Stores, Inc.

Although retailers such as Walmart and Target do have loyal customer bases, they are not sitting idle as Amazon and other eCommerce firms obtain a greater market share. They are expanding their online profiles and offering similar shopping experiences. However, they hold one major advantage over Amazon. Every store can serve as a distribution center. Walmart is a perfect example. It has expanded its online profile to provide eCommerce services to its customers (Thau, 2014). Because every store serves as a distribution center, customers can receive their order much faster than Amazon can deliver it.

Question 1: What were the rights of Walmart, the employer, during these two organizing drives?

The purpose of this business report is to gain familiarity with Wal-Mart and to learn about the different aspects that make Wal-Mart a successful company. This report gives an in-depth analysis of the company history, services and products provided, the company philosophy, business methods, organizational structure, and financial and competitive analysis.

Since 1962 and the beginning of the discount retailer market Wal-Mart has been ahead of the retail game. By 1967 there were 24 Wal-Marts that had grossed 12.6 million dollars. In just 7 years Wal-mart had spread into 9 states. By 1979 Wal-Mart was the fastest store to reach a billion dollars in sales. In 2005 Wal-Mart has 3,800 domestic stores along with 3,800 stores internationally, and had made over 312 billion dollars. As you can see the Wal-Mart empire has grown monumentally. To move into this segment of the market would be tough.

Walmart Corporation was open in 1962 by Sam Walton. The first Walmart was open in Roger, Arkansas to save money or better people life and live a better. Walmart has over 8,800 stores sites in 15 countries with 2.2million employees worldwide. Bentonville, Arkansas has the headquarters and distribution center of Walmart. The discount departs stores are known as the original stores.

4. Relations with Suppliers- Wal-Mart has in place a system that helps to achieve their goal of lower prices. This Information Technology system includes computers, networking, and internet that cuts inventories and waste and helps with speedy delivery. This system also helps Wal-Mart to keep in constant contact with suppliers by transferring the data that suppliers need so they know what Wal-Mart needs. Wal-Mart also works with suppliers to improve their production and squeezes the best prices out of its supplier. The video referred to Wal-Mart as the customer’s agent. All of this focus Wal-Mart puts on suppliers reduces costs and lowers prices. Wal-Mart’s technological/logistical leadership remains unmatched by competitors (Web, 2005).

The success of Wal-Mart is due in large part to its ability to consistently produce high quality products at a low cost. This is very critical to the future success of Wal-Mart because it provides consistency to customers who are price sensitive. By committing themselves to "Everyday low prices," Wal-Mart assures customers that the products sold within their stores are competitive in reference to its retail competition. This low price strategy also provides Wal-Mart with a

Wal-Mart was first opened in 1962 by Sam Walter as a retail store. It started out a five and dime store in Rogers, Arkansas and was called Walton’s. He opened this store with one goal in mind, to sale at the lowest prices possible, quality leadership and great customer services. He thought that his idea could change the retail industrial. Wal-Mart was built on a solid foundation that remains stable even after the death of Mr. Walton. Wal-Mart became the largest multinational retail store in America, with a grocery store and a pharmacy. There is a Wal-Mart in all fifty states and seventeen international states and has more than 2.3 million employees. This store

Like all departmental and/or discount stores, Wal-Mart's strategies are focused around achieving the goals such as building a large and strong customer base, under-cutting competitors, and organization of its supply chain in the most efficient and effective manner and above all, market growth.

Walmart, one of the largest retailers in the world, was founded by Sam Walton in 1962. The first Walmart opened in Rogers, AR. It has since grown to over 10,300 stores all over the world. Employing over 2 million, it is hard to imagine the largest private employer in the world would ever be accused of being an unfair employee practices. Walmart has seen its share of litigation over the years. Litigation over off the clock work, sexual discrimination, health care benefits, unions, and unfair labor treatment have plagued the company.

The company also ensured that its store-level operations were at least as efficient as its logistics operations. The stores were simply furnished and constructed using standard materials. As Wal-Mart distribution centers had close to real-time information on each store 's in-stock levels, the merchandise could be pushed to stores automatically. The display of merchandise was suggested by a storewide template after analyze historical store sales and community traits. If Wal-Mart discovers that a supplier promotes its own products at the expense of

Discussion Question: Which parts of the value chain does Wal-Mart target in order to achieve a low-cost advantage over its rivals? Answer: Wal-Mart has an extensive real-time information sharing network with vendors to make the supply chain much more efficient. It targets purchasing, store delivery, procurement practices that leverage the company’s relative buying power, investment in a large fleet of trucks for distribution of inventory, optimization of the product mix, use of security systems, preferred real estate rental and leasing rates, and lowering labor costs.

I hope had a joyous holiday and New Year. As a valued client, I am writing to inform you of a possible addition for your portfolio for 2006. I have been monitoring Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (Wal-Mart) and recently I conducted extensive analysis on the company’s financial performance. Throughout the following document, I will present the key pieces of information that I have gathered from my analysis to support my recommendation to purchase or not purchase shares of Wal-Mart. Then, based upon the information presented, you can best decide whether or not to include the equity in your portfolio. You will learn about the history of Wal-Mart and its operations, the number of locations and its competitors. From annual reports and 10-K filings, I will include factors for the company’s success, the competitive situation, as well as Wal-Mart’s strengths and weaknesses. The company overview provides a good backdrop to the quantitative data that is then presented for the retailing giant during 2004, 2005 and forecasted for 2006. The information will include Wal-Mart’s past financial performance during 2004 and 2005, as well as the associated ratios, and forecasted results for 2006 regarding potential financial operations, profitability or losses, as well as if the company will need to rely upon external borrowing. You will also receive the intrinsic value of Wal-Mart based upon the dividend discount model, assumptions to reach the stated conclusions and the required rate of

This system was estimated at 570 terabytes – which Wal-Mart claimed was bigger than all the fixed pages on the internet. This database is connected to Wal-Mart’s internal analysts who forecasts demand with suppliers, also it is connected to the supplier network which displays sales data in real time, and is directly connected to Wal-Mart’s distribution centres. The order in which the data is collected is from the store network, and then the sales data is collected at the cash registers, in which the information is simultaneously sent to the retail link database via global satellite transmission. This global satellite system and database has given Wal-Mart a large competitive advantage to other

Moreover, it was possible to deliver several Wal-Marts on a single tour, because of the special store arrangements. Thus it was possible to save in-bound logistics costs. Vendors were not allowed to provide more than 2.4% of Wal-Marts purchases, making the discount retailer independent and dominating its suppliers. Nevertheless, working with Wal-Mart is very profitable; the purchase of Procter & Gamble's products equals about 10% of their annual revenue. Through developing electronic invoicing and annual strategic business planning packages for the communication with the vendors, it was possible to reduce the inventory costs and to increase sales.